It was a battle of very successful, very flawed approaches, when you think about it.

The Miami Heat edged the New York Knicks with a closing round flurry Sunday, 93-85. The Heat looked like the much better team in the first and fourth quarters, New York the more complete and hungrier squad in the 2nd and 3rd. What we learned inside those two subsets revealed a pair of elements about both teams.

Both the Heat and the Knicks are extremely talented and when they are doing what they do best, can simply overwhelm the other team with talent.

Both the Heat and the Knicks suffer from a lack of cohesive effort. Mentally for the Heat, and approach for the Knicks.

The Heat had the same issues they’ve had for the past two years. After transforming into a flying death machine for the first quarter, getting out and running and creating havoc with superior physical ability, once the Knicks adjusted and started forcing containment, the Heat ran into complex coverage and started forcing it. You know the drill. Turnovers, off-balance jumpers, trying to out-talent the opponent with tough shots instead of using their talent to create easy ones.

So how did Miami win? Because New York’s approach is valiant, and impressive, and not at all sustainable. The Knicks relied on isolation plays from Carmelo Anthony consistently, and after 43 minutes, and when faced with varying coverages from Dwyane Wade and LeBron James, Anthony simply couldn’t seal the deal. Working your tail off on defense is what puts the Knicks in position to win, and great players hitting big shots is an indelible part of the NBA. But relying on it so much for 48 minutes is just not a sustainable approach. Synergy Sports indicates that Anthony went ISO 19 times against Miami. The Heat by comparison as a team went ISO 23 times, including 14 for LeBron James. That’s a lot of one-on-one play.

And in the end, the Heat made the plays. They shut down Anthony, who only had two field goals in the fourth. James and Wade each had two in the final five minutes. Combine that with some questionable decision making, and the Heat were able to finish off the Knicks.

Now, Anthony carried them with that same play for much of the game. Anthony was a monster, and it’s amazingly impressive that he can produce at that level given how hard it is to go one-on-five. But it’s not sustainable. There’s definitely a time and place for giving Anthony, arguably the best one-on-one player in the league right now, the ball and letting him do work. But after that many minutes and that many shots, defended by two of the best players in the league, it just didn’t work out.

The Knicks may have proved Sunday they can hang with Miami, scare them, force the issue, especially if Jeremy Lin and Amar’e Stoudemire return. But can they win? Maybe some. But overall?

The war looks a lot different than the individual battles. For the Heat, they get a road win against a playoff opponent who plays tough defense, by getting clutch scoring from their two stars. Both teams did what they do, and though from here it doesn’t look good enough to win a title, for the Heat it’s a good sign. For the Knicks, it’ll be a coin flip as long as this is their approach.

Tom Benson, the now 90-year-old owner of the New Orleans Pelicans and the NFL’s Saints, a few years back changed around the succession of control of the team after his passing — his wife Gayle will take control. Rita Benson LeBlanc, Benson’s granddaughter and former handpicked successor, sued saying Benson had been manipulated. After meeting privately with Benson, a judge ruled that while Benson suffered some “cognitive impairment” he was capable of making his own decisions and that Gayle remained the successor.

Benson has been sued multiple times since then, including by former Saints employee Rodney Henry, and the then-89-year-old Benson was deposed in that case last year.

During another set of questions, apparently aimed at establishing how close Benson and Henry had been, Benson was shown a photo of the two men with Pelicans star Anthony Davis.

“Who is this?” Williams asked.

“It’s Rodney and a basketball player,” Benson said. “Oh, hell, I forget his name. Let me — he’s a great player for us. Tell me his name, and I will tell you yes or no.”

When asked “is it Anthony Davis,” Benson said yes. The man is 90, I’m not sure that we should expect much. He had the foresight to bring in people to run his businesses — including his sports teams — and set up a line of succession for when he does pass. Smart moves.

Would Benson’s mental state impact potential changes coming to the Pelicans? Probably not. New Orleans’ GM Dell Demps bet big on going big in a league trending smaller, pairing Davis and DeMarcus Cousins. If that doesn’t work out, plenty of people around the league expect a house cleaning on the basketball side with the Pelicans. Benson’s mental state, whatever it may be, does not impact that.

The deposition leak came from an anonymous source (and anonymous email account, the paper verified the document before publishing). Who leaked it? It may be nearly impossible to find out, but only one side benefits from all this becoming public. And it’s not Benson.

A few years back in Philadelphia, the athletic K.J. McDaniels was a highlight factory and looked like a guy who could develop into a role player on the wing in the NBA.

Except, he never actually developed. Houston gave him a chance (three years at a total of $10 million), and it didn’t work out, then last season Brooklyn had him for 20 games, but they decided to move on.

Now Toronto is going to give him a chance, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN.

McDaniels’ agent later confirmed the news. This is a training camp, make-good contract for McDaniels. But unlike a lot of those contracts being handed out around this time, there is space on the Raptors roster for a player or two.

Before the KJ McDaniels partial, Toronto had $116.6M in guaranteed salary with 13 players + the $100K partial of Alfonzo McKinnie.

McDaniels will compete with Alfonzo McKinnie, Kennedy Meeks, and Kyle Wiltjer for one of the final roster spots in Toronto. Of that group, I’d most likely want to keep McDaniels because of the shot blocking and his potential — but his outside shot has to improve.

The Raptors can carry 15 on the roster and very possibly will until at least Jan. 10, which is the date these partially guaranteed deals become fully guaranteed for the season. Toronto is flirting with the tax line, and ownership is not going to want to pay the tax for this team, so if they do carry 15 they likely will cut it to 14 by that date.

The #DriveByDunkChallenge has been a fun distraction this summer. If you don’t know what it is, it essentially involves NBA players jumping out of their cars to dunk on regular folks on community basketball hoops.

There are still some serious doubts about whether the Celtics will be able to unseat the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference, but perhaps they won’t need to wait for long. Rumors are starting to trickle in about LeBron James leaving Ohio, so maybe by the time we are used to seeing Hayward in Celtics green next season they will have less competition out east.